Pokies money for AFL clubs

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The only reason we have 'taken the moral high ground' on this is because we can't afford to get into pokies.

I thought PDR approached the club and said he had access to pokies in a prime location which he could have got for the club but JB/board/Euge knocked him back saying we weren't going to get into pokies. We would have had to take a lease on the pokies but there isn't a financial institution that wouldn't back that given they are a license to print money when in a good location.

I think what was most disappointing was that clubs used research the government undertook for identifying the most vulnerable demographic and communities which needed additional resources to combat problem gambling addiction as a blueprint as to where to dump pokies to maximise the number of problem gamblers they generate, given problem gamblers represent about 60% of the revenue a pokie generates.

Those clubs raking in tens of millions are exploiting problem gamblers and exploit our most vulnerable of the citizens, it is disgraceful behaviour from clubs representing the community.
 
Showing my ten year gap in knowledge again here what happened to Kanga Kaisino? Did we not get up another venue somewhere else too

It was a small and often empty venue with a tiny number of machines which was wound up years ago.
 
I think what was most disappointing was that clubs used research the government undertook for identifying the most vulnerable demographic and communities which needed additional resources to combat problem gambling addiction as a blueprint as to where to dump pokies to maximise the number of problem gamblers they generate, given problem gamblers represent about 60% of the revenue a pokie generates.

Those clubs raking in tens of millions are exploiting problem gamblers and exploit our most vulnerable of the citizens, it is disgraceful behaviour from clubs representing the community.

It's disappointing, however what is most disappointing is that our Government and therefore by extension us, have allowed this.
 
It's disappointing, however what is most disappointing is that our Government and therefore by extension us, have allowed this.

Government is an institution of whores, run by whores, they are as addicted to gambling revenue as anyone else involved.

Why do crime lords who have amassed a huge wealth not go clean and get involved in legitimate businesses? Dirty money is easy money.
 

Jack Bradley

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I'm all for being socially responsible but I would also like to see us in the green and spending money on our footy department
 

GarnerSmash

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I'm all for being socially responsible but I would also like to see us in the green and spending money on our footy department
Pokies = a significant initial outlay in the millions, so if we want pokies, we have to deal with debt and the risk associated with running venues.
 

Sugar2Sideshow

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Sep 7, 2014
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The very nature of addiction is that one is unable to control their actions in the face of whatever vice they are addicted to. There has been numerous studies on addiction that recognize it is a serious disease and one that can be very difficult to overcome. To dismiss addiction and claim that it's a simple matter of taking responsibility for your actions is incredibly naive.

As for the pokies in general, they are horrible pernicious machines that have ruined peoples lives as they are so easily accessible and so simply operated. At times it is crucial to act in the morally righteous way, even at the expense of making easy money.
I believe, I haven't had a serious addiction, that there is a point before you get addicted where you have a choice. For example, I know myself I am very susceptible to gambling, I love the thrill of having money on a footy game or even watching the roulette wheel go round. I once went to crown with 300 bucks, and said of I lost it I was going to walk away. After about an hour of small bets on this and that I lost it all, went outside to the atm, withdrew 300 dollars and put it all on red.
I lost, walked back to the atm, then suddenly thought, "what the funk am I doing?!"

I haven't been back since. This is my experience at least, maybe pokies are somehow easier to get addicted to or something. Having said that, I can't say I'm sorry that we don't make money from pokies, considering the kind of people they get their money from.

But how do we make money outside of sponsorship, memberships and match day revenue?
 

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Whatever the reason I too am very glad that we don't have pokies to help fund our operations.

Back in the 1990's I witnessed a very sad situation with some clients. Really nice people but the husband was in the navy and took up smoking when posted to Korea during the Korean war and formed an addiction. He developed lung cancer shortly after retirement in the 1990's and died pretty quickly after that. His wife, was left very lonely and depressed and took to the pokies to try to take her mind off her woes. It became clear that she was running through her money, which wasn't a fortune in the first place and one night after having a last losing flutter, she went home and overdosed.

A form of addiction got the both of them and it was in my view a very sad situation.
 
Geelong president Colin Carter says AFL industry slow to realise poker machines are a big problem


GEELONG president Colin Carter says the AFL industry has been “complicit” in the harm caused by poker machines.



Carter said the game had been “slow to come to terms with the fact that we have got a big problem”.

The former AFL commissioner said the Cats — who turned over more than $10 million from two gaming venues last year — had the view that in the “long term that we would probably prefer to be out of the industry” but an exit was not now financially viable.

Short of getting rid of its pokies, Carter committed Geelong to becoming a best-practice gaming operator, indicating he was open to harm-minimisation reforms such as running only “con-free” poker machines.

Carter said the Cats also would be supportive of bet limits on machines should the government introduce them.

“If someone came to us and offered us a great price, a good price for the machines and what our investment is, we would probably take it,” Carter told the Herald Sun.

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“But it is a profitable business that we can’t afford to get out of at the moment because the whole footy industry economics rest on that, and I’m not about to put our football club at risk.”

Nine Victorian clubs took almost $90 million from gamblers’ pockets in the last financial year — about 20 per cent of their total revenue.

“I think the AFL has become — the AFL industry … has become seriously off the mark with this,” Carter said.


“I don’t think you can blame the AFL (for clubs getting into gaming) — the only blame I would have of the AFL is I think the AFL has been slow to come to terms with the fact that we have got a big problem.

“But we are all complicit in it. And there is no doubt the incentive at the moment is for the clubs to stay in it rather than get out.”

Carter is on the board of World Vision Australia — of which Alliance for Gambling Reform chairman Tim Costello is the chief executive.

He said some in the pokies reform movement believed football clubs continuing to run pokies venues was a better alternative than the machines falling into the hands of other operators who might “arguably belt them even more than we do”.

The Alliance hopes a legal definition for a “con-free” machine will be ruled on in an upcoming legal application run by Maurice Blackburn lawyers, which will aim to prove in the Federal Court that poker machines are a “misleading and deceptive” product.

“There’s various assessments that suggest that a percentage — might be 10, 20, 30 per cent — of the money that goes through these machines is tied with a fair bit of family damage,” Carter said.

“The question is, ‘Can you be in the industry and lessen that?’.

“What I’d like us to be is for when people say Geelong Football Club is one of the best sporting clubs in Australia, I want people to also say the way we run our gaming business is among the best in Australia — and by that I don’t mean most profitable, but the one which is acknowledged to deal with all the realities, the side effects, as well as anybody.”
 
So Carter says that pokies cause big problems but he's happy for Geelong to keep them?? :rolleyes: Would have been nice to see a mention that North don't have pokies too.

Nah I don't expect the President of another club to mention us.

If the topic gets wheels we should 100% be jumping all over it.

Would be good timing for us to get an article in a paper about some of the work that we are doing with the Victoria responsible gambling foundation.
 

Phillyroo

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Pokie machines are just a goddamn scourge!!! Preying on the vulnerable, and hurting the weak. I previously was involved in a venue that wanted to and has since been granted pokies.... It is disgusting in every aspect and has put this state back in so many ways.
 

Passmore

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So Carter says that pokies cause big problems but he's happy for Geelong to keep them?? :rolleyes: Would have been nice to see a mention that North don't have pokies too.

Yeah, pretty much "we know the impact pokies have on problem gambling, and we'd like to help, but not at the expense of our bottom line." Purely lip service to the problem.

Maybe Colin Cater and Steven Trigg should get together on this one.....:rolleyes:
 

Passmore

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Nah I don't expect the President of another club to mention us.

If the topic gets wheels we should 100% be jumping all over it.

Would be good timing for us to get an article in a paper about some of the work that we are doing with the Victoria responsible gambling foundation.

I would hope that funky Carl is teeing something up at this very moment.
 
Showing my ten year gap in knowledge again here what happened to Kanga Kaisino? Did we not get up another venue somewhere else too
We applied for and had our licence for the pokier machines moved from Kanga Kasino to our bar at Docklands. When we decided that the bar at Docklands wasn't viable years later the club made the decision to then end our affiliation with pokies and I believe handed back our licence.
 

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